Mt Whitney Zone Forums General Discussion Whitney Main Trail in Winter?

And here is Wayne Pyle's annotated picture of the switchbacks, from this post.

Click here to see the full version.

You can see the old trail about switcher 20, rejoining at 90. And more abandoned trail pieces at 92 & 94.

1. Are those glissade "trails" down the side of the ledge from the top? (in Bob's picture) If so, please comment on the practice from this location.

2. Changing the trail to accomodate melting patterns -- was such a luxury a sign of the times or would such an undertaking be considered today?

Again, sorry if these questions have all been answered before; the effort of doing a search for every question I have would be a monumental task.(do to the hit and miss luck that I have with the WPSMB search engine....or my choice of search words)(feel free to direct me if there does exist good existing material on the past threads)

B

Amen brother. There was still enough ice to be cautious about in late August last year when I was introduced to it.

And Bee, regarding the switchback topo map prepared by Wayne Pyle, I heartily recommend it for a first time ascent. Not only is it quite accurate, but it helps alleviate some of the boredom that comes with that many switcheroos. It's in Excel format and easily printable to one (light) page. Same link as Steve indicated above.

Bee,

I started doing this stuff mid in life and I am a bit more cautious than most because of it. This goes a long way to explain why I did not do the spring ascent I've wanted to do a long time until I had 4 years of experience using axe and crampons.

1. Tracks...In May 2007 the glissade was trackless. We came back at about 2 PM and went down the slope until escaped the shade, then glissaded for about 800 vertical feet. The most times a track is used the slicker it is...and the less control you have.

2. Luxury...I don't know. I guess it depends what is the budget. They moved New Army Pass trail over about 5' to 10' through Horseshoe Meadow a few years ago. That seemed to be to an unnecessary luxury to me at the time.

1. Are those glissade "trails" down the side of the ledge from the top? (in Bob's picture) If so, please comment on the practice from this location.

Yes, they're glissade trails. In good conditions, glissading from the top is a nice way to descend and save some time.

I glissaded that route with a group on a June day, two days after a storm. We all had full backpacks, and one of the group did a 360 forward roll during the descent, but came out ok. We descended in the morning after camping on the summit, and the snow was soft.

However, in poor conditions, it can be deadly. If the snow has been through a number of freeze/thaw cycles, and people descend late in the afternoon, the upper part is still in the sun and conditions might seem ok. But the mountain shadow starts from the bottom and moves upslope as the sun moves across the sky, so the bottom can freeze up first. People have died glissading that section in icy conditions.

2. Changing the trail to accommodate melting patterns -- was such a luxury a sign of the times or would such an undertaking be considered today?

Trails seem to get changed or improved, and this trail is one of the most traveled in the Sierra, so fixing it makes sense. I am sure with budgets these days, there is not as much trail construction as in the past.

...
As for searching, I don't think your question regarding moving the trail has been discussed before. But Bob R posted another excellent composite picture of the switchbacks maybe two years ago, but I sure can't find it now. It was one where you could zoom in and count all the hikers on the switchbacks.

Thank you for the explanations. I have a lot of questions...speaking of -- maybe you could get a copy of that composite picture from Bob? (I bother him too much already)

B

"2. Changing the trail to accommodate melting patterns -- was such a luxury a sign of the times or would such an undertaking be considered today?

Trails seem to get changed or improved, and this trail is one of the most traveled in the Sierra, so fixing it makes sense. I am sure with budgets these days, there is not as much trail construction as in the past."

It is my understanding that the old trails were a nightmare of maintenance. The slopes are simliar to that below Shepherd Pass....loose scree and boulders, constantly shifting and falling onto the trail, wiping it out. To maintain it required huge efforts. The current trail is built into more solid rock (I understand a fair amount of blasting was required), and is far more stable. The work that has to be done now, is far less technical that that of the old trails. So, it seems that it was a "pay me now or pay me later" type of situation, where future funding was doubtful.

I have a dim memory of the last major trail rebuilding on the switchbacks - I think it was in the late '90's. I believe the first year the trail was completely closed on specific dates, and the following year there was the possibility there might be delays. The first year I planned my trip around the dates, and the next year I had to plan the hike around the delays.

A general comment on glissading from near the top of the last(first?) switchback - the slope curves slightly to the left (north), so it's prudent to move a couple of hundred yards east (away from the crest) before beginning the glissade to compensate. Otherwise, you can be "drawn" into the rocks/boulders, and if you don't watch your speed, with possible disastrous results. Also - because of its exposure - it refreezes relatively early in the afternoon, and it's NOT a slope you want to slide on if it is icy/hardpack.

I found Wayne Pyle labeled BobR's picture posted on the first page of this thread. Thanks to Bob R for taking it, and to Wayne for labeling.

Here is the picture. Click on it to see the full-size version, where you can read the switchback numbers.


The original threads are here:
    BobR's Photo of the 97 Switchbacks
    Wotans Throne, 23 June

Just a great visual of those damn things - kudos to Bob and Wayne! Those glissade tracks just pucker me up . . .

I've done both the Main Trail and the Mountaineer's Route a bunch of times in winter. They each have their pleasures (and displeasures, I might have said, but I cannot speak of displeasures in these mountains--even in the wildest of storms!).

Technically, the MR can be considered tougher than the MT because of the 400' above The Notch. Elsewhere the technical difficulty is about the same, with the MR chute equating roughly to the chute below Trail Crest.

But in terms of total effort, I view the MT as the tougher of the two because of its length--11.2 miles vs 4.1, plus the walk from where you have to park to the Portal. (Although that 11.2 miles is considerably shortened in winter, when you are off the trail a fair amount.) The hike to Trail Camp is always a nice stroll through beautiful winter landscapes, as is that to Iceberg Lake. And the two chutes are roughly equivalent, as I said. But above those chutes, while the MR has a 400' remaining climb to the summit, the MT has a long two miles to go. Last weekend, the snow conditions meant that those two miles would take as much as four hours, and almost that long to get back to Trail Crest.

And, speaking again of last weekend as well as the weekend before, I observe that most parties this year are going up the MR, leaving the MT relatively vacant. Crowds are particularly bothersome above Iceberg Lake, whereas the same numbers of people anywhere on the MT are hardly noticeable.

All things considered, I personally prefer the Main Trail for the overall winter mountaineering experience.

My pictures from last weekend: http://www.flickr.com/photos/rockwellb/sets/72157623682223366/
And Bob H's: http://www.flickr.com/photos/rescuebob81/sets/72157623679250018/

Ahhhh...this confirms a suspicion that I had all along: parts of the MR can almost seem congested at times, during the winter. SOmeone even mentioned that they had to come down a different way from the Final 400 because others were ascending.

1)Do I understand correctly that the (steep) slope below Trail Crest is the alternate route in Winter, due to the snowed-in condition of the cables?

2) Is a glissade mandatory to exit the (steep) slope below Trail Crest, or could one plunge step down this route? (I have never seen the area except in photos, so I am not meaning to sound obtuse)

B

1. Yes, on the main trail. Not just because of the cables, but because the trail on the switchbacks are filled in with ice the whole way.

2. Glissade is NOT mandatory...in fact should never be mandatory in any situation I can think of. It may go a little far, but I'd say you wouldn't want to glissade on something you can't plunge step. You may not be able to plunge step, once the slope has set up for the afternoon in the lower half (It can become, in the parlance, "boilerplate" ice), and the only way down might be facing-in crampon work. One might find the switchbacks safer, maybe not. This is a real judgment situation. The best alternative may be a bivy, and wait for the next day's sun to soften the snow. Of course, one has to be prepared for that, and people have often gotten themselves onto the frozen slope, and found that there IS no place to bivy. This gets grim pretty fast.

1) Is the shadow movement predictable enough to plan a trip around the condition of this slope? (a predictable window)

2) Is the icing on this slope mostly shadow/temp based? (meaning, are the conditions going uphill irrelevent/unrelated to those of the return trip)

Bee,

We went in mid-May 2007. By 2 PM shadows were starting to creep down the slope. Since the temperature were in the 30 to 40* F range we down climbed...face in, to where the slope was bathed in sun, then glissaded the rest of the way down. We played it safe at the top...this being our first glissade of this length.

Conditions and your skill set determine what can do in any situation.

I have witnessed people descending being stopped dead in their tracks at the cables. They did not move for the forty minutes we were at Trail Camp. That area in the winter is the no fun zone both ascending and descending.

Hi Bee,
Please allow me to recommend that you take an avalanche course, like the one presented by Sierra Mountain Center. There are several other companies that offer similar instruction. Formal, expert instructions will go a long way to helping you explore the winter world in safety. Limited information from forum posters, however good, can only scratch the surface of what you need to know.

http://www.sierramountaincenter.com/winter_avalanche_courses1.html

Another good resource is the Eastern Sierra Avalanche Center http://esavalanche.org/, which gives up to date information on current avalanche conditions.

Thank you for the info, Bob. I have spent a lot of hours climbing up and down steep, snowy slopes, but the big BIG difference is that these slopes were Black Diamond GROOMED ski slopes, and I was usually retrieving gear lost in a fall-- no risk of avalanche. After watching a video of a guy trapped minutes during an avalanche (he had a helmet cam) I was cured of any desire to bee careless in the snow.

I think I saw that video in my avy class. Guy was skiing, following a guide, but then guide went right and the guy went left, triggered an avalanche, and got buried. You could hear his breathing and panic on the soundtrack. Positively chilling. He was lucky that he was with people who knew how to use the avy gear.

That's the one -- I could not get that video out of my head for days.

I'm with you on that. I saw it two years ago...still stuck on it....